Roberts notes BuzzFeed still needs do better if it wants to be respected as a journalistic authority:

This response does not acknowledge to Inman or BuzzFeed’s readers how completely the rest of the venom-filled story collapses when the error is removed. …

BuzzFeed’s growing stature means it deserves a few minutes over the coals. The site made its name with funny cat pictures but is now a major force in serious media. In the last year, it has partnered with the New York Times to cover political conventions and launched New Yorker style long-form journalism. If BuzzFeed wants to enjoy the prestige of those publications, it will have to do a better job of owning its mistakes.

Biggest media story of 2012. IMHO. Buzzfeed has a Jayson Blair-size problem now — different in scandal but similar in proportional damage — all without having the actual prestige of even Don van Natta’s trash can.

mbarnett

I posted this over at GigaOM and I’ll post it here, as well.

In an article I read this morning, I noticed that Ben infers Buzzfeed
is a legitimate news site. The lack of fact-checking, personal
assassination, and misinformation tells me that Buzzfeed is anything
but. What the site is is the standard-bearer for everything that’s wrong
with today’s social journalism.

Buzzfeed and Mr. Stuef’s complete lack of journalistic integrity
aside, the article was poorly structured and showed stylistic
sensibilities I’d expect to see from a high school freshman, not someone
who supposedly writes professionally. And lets not even talk about the
ad hominem attacks loosely masquerading as “reporting”, which the author
chose to include. This isn’t professional journalism; it’s a hack
taking advantage of the broadcast nature of social media to grind a
personal axe (and poorly, at that). Oh and talk about pot and kettle –
apparently it’s okay to ridicule a child with Down’s but heaven forbid
someone make a mistake and post an uncomfortable and ill-advised joke
about sexual assault.

Is it any wonder that social “journalists” today find themselves held
in lower regard than their legitimate counterpoints? The bar has sunk
so low, it’s shameful. There is no code of ethics for this new breed of
journalist – and I use that term loosely – and quasi-news sites like
Buzzfeed. The content they deliver is as shallow as their writing and
reporting.

Buzzfeed and Steuf should be glad that The Oatmeal’s rebuttal (and
the disgust and mistrust they’ve earned from the Internet vigilante mob)
is the only reprisal they’ve faced so far. I for one, will be avoiding
Buzzfeed and anything written by Steuf, who is the epitome of lazy,
sleazy, and untalented tabloid reporters everywhere.

EDIT: Looks like Buzzfeed has removed all public comments and links on its Facebook page. Open dialog be damned, eh?

http://www.facebook.com/ssohmer Slade Sohmer

This Ben Smith quote says it all: “I think that we are more like the New York Times than we are like Reddit. We’re a news organization, basically.” If BuzzFeed, the self-proclaimed “First True Social News Organization,” wants to be more like the New York Times than a social news aggregator with no consequences like Reddit, then it might want to start by acknowledging not just its trivial errors, but its massive screw-ups as well.